Two aid workers held by Somali gunmen for 108 days said they feared death daily while the agency they work for said no ransom was paid for their release.

Keiko Akahane, 32, a medical doctor from Japan, and Dutchman Willem Sools, a 27-year-old nurse, spoke at a news conference Jan. 10 after arriving in Paris, where their aid agency Medecins du Monde (Doctors of the World) is based.

"Every day I was afraid we might get killed. In the first week, then month, we didn't know when we'd get killed ― was it tonight or tomorrow night?" Akahane told reporters, speaking in Japanese. "Every time we heard the guns, we thought this is the end."

Akahane and Sools were kidnapped in Ethiopia and taken across the border to Mogadishu, the capital of Somalia. The impoverished nation has been left reeling by factional fighting. They were released in Mogadishu on Jan. 7.

The president of Medecins du Monde, Pierre Micheletti, told reporters he was reluctant to discuss the details of their release but said "there was no financial transaction."